


hurt me because you love me

by blamethemusk



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Blood, Burnplay, Dom Castiel (Supernatural), Enthusiastic Consent, Gentle Dom Castiel (Supernatural), Knifeplay, Light Bondage, M/M, Masochism, Oral Sex, Painplay, Sex Toys, Sub Sam Winchester
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-23
Updated: 2019-07-23
Packaged: 2020-07-11 21:51:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19935076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blamethemusk/pseuds/blamethemusk
Summary: Sam is a masochist.Castiel is not a sadist, but he can adapt.





	hurt me because you love me

**Author's Note:**

> I literally never thought I'd write Castiel as a dom.  
> what the fuck.  
> Editing to add because I forgot when posting: thank you to Triss Ry and BlindSwanDive for the beta!

Castiel planted one hand on Sam’s left shoulder, skimmed over his side with the fingers of his other hand, and dug his thumb into the fresh cut on his back, just below his lowest rib.

Sam’s breath caught harsh in his throat, a sharp, choked inhale. He let out a few cut off, poorly managed cries, but muffled them, burying his face into the sheets he was lying on. His hands fisted in his hair.

“How’s that?” Cas asked. Sam nodded in tiny, twitchy motions without lifting his face from the bed. “Tell me, Sam.”

Sam turned his face so that Castiel, from his position straddling Sam’s hips, could just see the shape of his nose and mouth in the crook of his elbow. His breaths were shallow and rapid. 

“Keep going,” he panted. “Please.”

Castiel nodded, more to himself than for Sam’s benefit, and adjusted his position, settling his weight a little further back from Sam’s hips and moving the hand he was using to restrain Sam to the base of his neck, avoiding the burns he’d previously left on his upper back and shoulders. His thumb was already buried in Sam’s skin up to the first knuckle. When he pressed all the weight of his upper body into it, Sam wailed. He bucked up against Cas’ hold on him, and one of his hands left his hair to grasp blindly for it, fingers clinging to Cas’ wrist. Castiel’s thumb sank into the flesh, parting it with almost unsettling ease until it could go no further into the relatively narrow entry point. New blood bubbled and oozed around the digit, running down over Sam’s side and staining the sheets.

Sam couldn’t stay silent in the wake of that. Even after the initial push, when his screams gave way to whimpers, they were pronounced in the silent room. He quaked under Castiel’s hands. 

“Sam?” Cas asked. Sam didn’t answer. Castiel didn’t begrudge him for it. “I’m pulling it out. Are you ready for that?”

The tight noise Sam made could be interpreted as an attempt at an “uh huh,” so Cas went ahead and removed his thumb, releasing his hold on Sam’s neck as soon as he was clear. Sam instantly went boneless, deflating like Cas’ thumb had been holding all his strength inside, and he’d just let it escape. 

Sam lay panting, head turned to the side, eyes closed. Castiel ran his bloody hand over Sam’s forehead, brushing the hair from his face and soothing him like a frightened pet.

It was abundantly obvious why this was something Dean would never be able to provide for his brother. Why he couldn’t even be in the same wing of the bunker, lest he hear Sam’s screams and come running, even in spite of knowing better.

“How are you, Sam?” Castiel asked, watching him closely.

“Green,” Sam breathed.

Cas ran his hand down Sam’s spine. “No further than that,” he said.

“Green. I’m okay.”

“And I want you to stay okay,” Cas said, and leaned forward to kiss a patch of unmarred skin on Sam’s shoulder. “Just because I can put you back together doesn’t mean I should vivisect you.”

Sam gave a tired grimace of a smile. “Fair enough,” he said. “Cauterize it?”

“If you’d like.”

“Please,” Sam breathed, like a sigh of relief.

Sitting up on his knees and taking his weight off of Sam’s hips and ass, Cas reached over to the night stand, where a silver soup spoon had been waiting, bowl heated to searing by the flame of the candle it was balanced over. The handle was warm, too, too warm perhaps to be comfortable for a human to hold, but Castiel didn’t mind, and collected the utensil before settling back down and retrieving a recently discarded bloodstained towel from within the sheets. He carefully wiped the worst of the blood from the gaping wound and held pressure against it for a minute or so to ensure the flow was stopped. It wasn’t the cleanest way to treat it - if Cas wasn’t intending to magic the wound away in a few hours, it would be a definite infection risk - but it did the job.

“Here it comes,” Cas said, and half a beat later Sam’s whole body jerked as the spoon was pressed against his skin, sizzling faintly, drowned out entirely by the grunts as Sam clenched his teeth and tried futilely to rein himself in. He groaned and tried to jerk away from the pain, only to be trapped against the mattress by Castiel’s weight. He clutched at the sheets, but his limbs seemed incapable of ceasing their escape attempts, rejecting to control of Sam’s conscious mind, and flitted from the sheets, to his hair, to the headboard, to slapping futilely against the mattress.

Cas removed the spoon and Sam heaved out one more magnificent grunt of pain before falling still again. The skin Castiel had parted with a scalpel earlier had been knit crudely back together in a raw, red oval of destroyed epidermis.

“Are you getting close?” Cas asked, as he leaned over to replace the spoon on the candle.

“Not quite,” Sam admitted sheepishly. “I’m sorry.”

Castiel straightened up, and brought one leg over to join the other, kneeling and then laying down beside Sam. “Don’t apologize,” he said, settling in against Sam as Sam rolled himself a fraction of the way over, staying on his belly but facing Cas. “If it takes all night, it takes all night. I’m just worried you’re nearing overstimulation.”

“I’ll be alright,” Sam mumbled, more defensive than dismissive.

“Sam,” Cas said in a warning tone. Sam was being incredibly evasive in his eye contact given they were just inches apart.

Cas touched Sam’s face, got a grip on his jaw and forced him to look at him directly. His eyes were soft, tired. It took a beat too long for him to focus on Cas’ face, though if it was from the pain alone or the fog of subspace, Cas couldn’t tell.

“Remember, Sam,” he said. “We don’t stop at a level you can  _ survive,  _ we stop at a level which is  _ healthy _ for you. Just because you can take more doesn’t mean you should, and you have to help me understand where your limits are.”

It took Sam a moment to respond, seemingly needing to consciously resettle himself into lucidity where his more sensible thoughts crashed up against the haze of the scene. “Maybe a few minutes rest?” Sam asked softly.

The corner of Castiel’s mouth quirked up. “Of course,” he said, and placed a kiss on his cheek. “You’re doing so incredibly well, Sam. And so beautifully.”

“Thank you,” Sam whispered, barely there even in the quiet space. “Could I-- when we come back, could I have the cuffs, too?”

“Your hands are getting restless, yes,” Cas said. “Of course.”

In spite of his position, both physically and within the night’s dynamic, Sam took the initiative on the next kiss, and Cas returned it deeply. They took the time for an unhurried, almost luxurious makeout session for Sam’s break, and when the rush of heat settled a little, Castiel reluctantly pulled off, edging himself away from Sam and off the bed. 

“I’ll get the cuffs and be right back,” he said, with a last peck to Sam’s cheek, and then made his way over to the dresser.

“No one else will do this for me, you know,” Sam said. Cas turned from rummaging in the drawer and found Sam still lounging on his side, watching him with that tired, half-focused look in his eyes.

“I know,” Cas agreed. He retrieved the cuffs - the thick, leather kind, with soft linings and buckles instead of locks - and a little bonus item, and placed it all on top of the dresser while he fought to close the stiff old drawer. He then returned to the bed.

“I’ve tried other doms,” Sam continued. Castiel sat down on the edge of the bed and opened up one cuff, then the other. “They either didn’t want to do it for real, or they didn’t wanna stop. They wanted roleplay, or more control, or they just wanted me to break.”

Cas held one cuff out, open and inviting, and Sam gladly extended his wrist and allowed Cas to buckle it up. “I’m sorry to hear that,” Cas said.

“I didn’t want any of that,” Sam said. “And it’s such a weird balance that I can’t just trust anyone to not put me in a bad place. With… with everything that’s happened. I just… it just needs to hurt.”

“It must not be easy,” Castiel said. He kissed the palm of Sam’s other hand before getting to work on wrapping its wrist up, too. “Being a masochist who can’t trust sadists.”

“You’re so special for that,” Sam said. “And for other reasons, but that too. You’re the only one.”

Cas hummed, thinking about it as he cinched tight the last buckle and attached the short chain to the D-ring on one cuff. “Well, I’m not a sadist,” he mused. “I don’t hurt you because hurting you gives me pleasure, Sam, I hurt you because it because it brings  _ me  _ pleasure to bring  _ you _ pleasure, and pain is what makes you feel good.”

A tiny laugh escaped Sam, like he hadn’t even realized it was coming until it was there. “So, in other words, you hurt me because you love me?”

Castiel couldn’t help but make a sour face. “I hate that that’s even a turn of phrase,” he complained. “But… yes, I suppose in this context, it’s technically accurate.”

“I’m glad you do,” Sam said.

“Hurt you, or love you?” Castiel asked.

“Both,” Sam sighed contentedly, and settled back down onto his belly. He brought his hands up and gripped at two adjacent slats of the headboard with the lightest touch until Castiel had finished winding the chain through and attaching it at the other end.

Instead of climbing back on, however, Cas luxuriated in a moment of stroking Sam’s hair, and massaging his neck and shoulders. “I brought you something else, too,” he said teasingly.

“Mm?” Sam hummed. “Pain thing?”

“No,” Cas said. “I think maybe a bit of contrast may help you along to the pleasure portion of the evening.”

Still plainly in Sam’s line of sight, Castiel retrieved the as-yet-untouched bottle of lube from the nightstand. He shuffled down the bed, towards Sam’s legs, and pulled off his boxers as Sam shifted and kicked in an uncoordinated attempt to help.

“If your mind wants the sour and your libido wants the sweet,” Cas explained, squeezing a light dab of lubricant onto his fingers. “Maybe we just need to give your libido a little taste of what it wants so it remembers what your mind already knows - that the sweet and sour are better together.”

Castiel’s finger sliding inside of Sam pulled out a soft, happy sound. One finger alone was far, far less than Sam could comfortably take, and more than he really needed for the toy Castiel had in store for him, but Cas’ methodical practice in sex, among other things, dictated he ease Sam through one finger, then a second, before attempting anything else.

He slathered the two inch long bullet vibrator with lube, and lined it up. “I’d give you the controls,” Castiel said, slipping it into Sam with the lightest pressure, his ass sucking it right in. “But the cord isn’t nearly long enough.”

Once the bullet was settled, pressed by Cas’ finger, oh so slowly, up inside of Sam until it rested on his sweetest of sweet spots, Castiel wiped his hands on the towel and returned to the nightstand one last time to collect his other tools. Sam groaned when he climbed back onto his hips, as it rested Castiel’s body weight heavily on his ass, and shifted the bullet ever so slightly inside of him.

“Are you ready to continue, Sam?” Cas asked.

Cas caught Sam smiling as he nodded, and he flicked the toy on. 

The first few minutes were spent allowing Sam to adjust to the vibration, listening to the soundtrack of his almost imperceptibly elevated breathing, settling his weight as Sam’s hips bucked or twitched involuntarily. It was a pleasant ambiance for the prep work Castiel needed to do.

He poured a little water onto a clean towel before recapping the bottle, and cleaned the shallow pools and rivers of blood off Sam’s back. Along the way he healed over a few marks, not enough that Sam should really suffer any loss to his experience, but enough that Castiel had an ample canvass to work with.

“Are you cleaning up?” Sam asked, a little breathy.

“Only to get you dirty again,” Castiel promised. “Be patient.”

The scalpel was a delicate, precise tool. Cas wiped his hands down one more time, needing a good grip for the artwork he was planning on creating. 

Cas leaned forward, putting his weight on Sam’s upper back. He held the knife like a pen, blunt side of the blade pressed into the pad of his index finger, tip poised to draw out his message in Sam’s skin, and when the moment felt just right, he made the first stroke. 

Sam’s answering noise of pain was just a soft groan - a light, clean cut was nothing new, nothing that intense on nights like this. The counterbalance of the vibrator in his ass, however, must have held him like a taut wire - even a light hum of pleasure and a faint, holistic ache were enough to pull him to opposite sides of himself. He wrapped his fingers around the headboard slats for something to hold on to.

Sam hissed and hummed as Castiel drew shallow channels in his back, stopping now and again to wipe excess blood from the scalpel and the skin. In contrast to his earlier flailing and screaming at what he himself refused to acknowledge as ‘too much’, he seemed now to be twitching and grumbling at ‘not enough’.

“Something to say, Sam?” Cas asked, after Sam had finally let out what could be charitably described as a petulant whine.

“You’re teasing,” Sam complained. “C’mon, Cas.”

“Do you not like it?” Cas lifted the scalpel and wiped away another rivulet of blood. Sam hissed behind his teeth at the rough rub of cotton on open wounds.

“Didn’t say that,” Sam replied. “Just… just want more.”

“You’ll get more, I promise,” Cas said. “At the risk of repeating myself: be patient.”

“You trying being patient with a jackhammer on your prostate,” Sam grumbled. 

“Shall I turn the vibration down?” Cas asked casually, picking up the control panel.

“No!” Sam cried, then brought himself back in check. “Just… give me something more to work with.”

“I’m nearly done with the outline,” Cas said. “I’ll be going back and widening the lines out, and that’ll involve taking thin slices of skin. How does that sound?”

From the way Sam shivered under him at the threat, Castiel felt he had his answer. He returned, now uninterrupted, to his careful carving.

When he moved on to the second pass, as promised, Cas widened the lines of each letter by slicing adjacent, diagonal lines that tore minuscule prisms of flesh out of Sam’s back. Predictably, Sam’s reactions intensified a hundred fold. 

The first carefully extracted strip of skin brought a long held, full throated vocalization out of Sam, not quite a scream, but not under his own control. The upped intensity of the pain put a point on the pleasure, clearly, as his hips shifted now and then as he rubbed his trapped cock against the mattress. Castiel found himself smiling with satisfaction, having finally brought Sam’s disparate parts into sync with one another. Finally, he’d given Sam what he so desired.

Sam’s tolerance for the pain waxed and waned, slightly. Over the second line of Castiel’s carved message, he huffed and groaned. Over the fourth, he let out barely muffled wails, breathed so desperately and shallowly Cas might have thought he would cry if he didn’t know better.

And then, at last, the full stop. Two fat dots, that Castiel pressed into the skin with a point-first, half inch deep stab and a 180 degree twist of the blade. Sam screamed through both, voice cracking out on the second.

Cas dropped the scalpel and laid hands on Sam’s skin, soothing him as he trembled, running his palms over the unblemished skin of his lower back, and then lifting up to stroke his shoulders and neck, run fingers through his hair.

“All done, Sam,” Cas said softly, almost a whisper. “You’ve done so well, do you know that? You’re so strong.”

Sam didn’t reply, just breathed harshly through his nose, slumped against the mattress, and took the comfort. Still whispering, mumbling, spilling sweet praise over him, Castiel left one hand on Sam’s shoulder while reaching awkwardly with the other to tug open the buckles of the cuffs. 

“Are you alright?” Cas asked. He shifted to lay back down beside Sam.

“Yes,” Sam breathed. “Yes, Cas, thank you, thank you so much.”

Castiel kissed him. “Ready for the good part?” He asked.

Sam laughed, though it was a sound of absolute exhaustion, and he still trembled with the pain. “Not gonna take long,” he said.

“Is it alright if I roll you over?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Sam mumbled, and tried weakly to push himself up on his elbows. It only took a moment between them to flip Sam onto his back, and he landed with a shout, all his weight suddenly pressed up against his impressive collection of fresh, open wounds.

Though it had yet to receive any more attention than some aborted thrusts against the bedsheets, Sam’s cock was not lagging behind. The continuous buzzing against Sam’s prostate had taken care of that. Castiel wasted very little time. He’d done his teasing already - no amount of kisses to the creases of thighs or gentle brushes of fingertips were going to get Sam any more revved up - and so he cradled Sam’s balls in one hand, steadied the base of his cock with the other, and began pressing open mouthed kisses up the shaft to the head.

As Cas started to suck at the tip, Sam gingerly shifted himself around for a more comfortable position, finding the balance that kept his back aching but not screaming at him. He planted one foot flat on the bed, opening up his pelvis, and, almost timidly, like he wasn’t quite sure he was allowed to touch, he brushed Cas’ hair from his face.

Cas looked up at Sam. The head of his dick popped out of his mouth, slow strokes in his fist taking over. “No one is submitting right now,” he said. “You can touch.”

Sam sighed like he was relaxing into the words, into his own body, and allowed himself to thread his fingers into Castiel’s hair, his thumb absently stroking Cas’ temple. Cas returned to the task in front of him, putting his mouth back on Sam, pressing his tongue up against the underside of him. He worked himself up to taking half of Sam’s cock into his mouth at a time, then a little more and a little more, sucking all the while. His throat spasmed and he pulled off to cough and catch his breath, taking a moment to reset before diving right back it.

The sensations throughout Sam’s body, his back, his cock, his ass, played in harmony with each other like a symphony. Things started to spiral out of control as Cas managed to get the head of Sam’s cock into his throat and swallow around it. Sam’s grip on Castiel’s hair reflexively tightened, and Cas made a startled humming noise that reverberated through Sam.

“Cas,” Sam breathed. “Cas, I’m gonna be there in a second.”

Castiel acknowledged him with another hum, and released his balls to fumble for the bullet vibe’s control panel. Sam hadn’t quite processed what was happening when Cas dipped down again, taking as much of Sam’s cock as he could, and tweaked the vibrator’s settings decidedly  _ up. _

Sam screamed when he came. It was loud, and it would have been long if his voice hadn’t cracked and strangled the sound, his body practically convulsing with the force of it. The first spurt, Cas tried to swallow, but he soon pulled off, letting Sam come across his own chest and let what was left in his mouth dribble back out onto Sam’s belly. 

It was a powerful, intense orgasm until the instant it was over, when suddenly the sustained vibration against his prostate was far, far too much for Sam. Luckily, Cas was already flicking the toy off, and, once Sam had stopped shaking quite so violently, gingerly dragged it out of him via the cord.

“Beautiful,” Cas whispered to himself. He kissed Sam’s hipbone. 

“Oh my God, Cas,” Sam panted a moment later, as Castiel rejoined him in laying flat, head at the top of the bed. Cas grabbed a discarded towel and gave his chest and stomach a perfunctory wipe before settling down against him. “That was…” 

Sam trailed off. He was still struggling to steady his breathing, and as Cas waited for him to be ready to talk, he was distressed to hear a harsh, shallow inhale become a sob.

“Sam?” Cas asked, reaching out for him. Sam had the glimmer of an unshed tear or two in his eyes. “Oh, Sam, I’m sorry.”

“No, no,” Sam said, rushing to appease Cas. He wiped his eyes, and rolled over onto his side to collect Cas up in an embrace. “It was just… a lot. Good intense, I promise. Thank you. Thank you so much.”

“Are you certain?” Cas asked.

Sam smiled through his watery, sniffly expression, grabbed Cas’ face, and kissed him firmly on the mouth. Cas gladly kissed back. “Yeah, I’m sure,” he said, a minute later when he let go. “Just c’mere. Just hold me for a minute.”

“Of course,” Castiel whispered, and wrapped his arms around Sam. “Of course.”

It took a few minutes for Sam to settle down, to stop shivering and clinging quite so desperately, and at long last, he finally relaxed into the embrace. Castiel held him close, careful not to hold him over the marks he’d left. They stayed exactly like that, breathing each other in as the remnants of the scene faded away, until Sam, exhausted and distracted, fell asleep without really meaning to.

When Sam woke again, it was already mid morning, and he was alone. Nothing much else about the room seemed to have changed - the candle on the bedside table had been snuffed out, the scalpel was missing, but the bloody towels, bullet vibe, and cuffs were still strewn about the unmade bed. He was still nude, and his back still ached and stung. He sat up, throwing his legs over the side of the bed, and stretched.

Before he had long to worry, however, the bedroom door creaked open, and Cas, clean, clearly freshly showered, and dressed in a pajama set of Sam’s, pushed his way inside with two steaming mugs, and the scent of coffee drifted through the room.

“Good morning,” Cas said, realizing Sam was awake. “I apologize, I thought you’d sleep a little longer.”

“No worries,” Sam replied, with a smile. “As long as one of those is for me, all is forgiven.”

“Hm,” Cas hummed, side of his mouth quirking up in one of his trademark half-smirks. “I  _ was _ going to drink them both myself…”

“You’re full of shit,” Sam laughed.

Cas handed him a mug and kissed him on the forehead. “Are you ready to be healed?” He asked.

“Yeah,” Sam said, though with some uncertainty in his voice. “But I wanted to see what you did, first. Whatever you were carving, you were very careful about it.”

Castiel’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh, of course,” he said, and placed his coffee cup on the nightstand before walking around the other side of the bed and unplugging his charging cell phone, as Sam turned to watch. “Let me take a photo, so you can see.”

Sam turned back around, and tried to straighten his posture, putting his back on full display as the canned digital camera shutter noise sounded. In an instant, Castiel was back by his side, sitting next to him and holding up the small screen.

Among a starfield of burns, bruises, and deeper cuts, there were five neatly spaced rows of bold, raw text, carved out in large characters of what appeared to be Hebrew.

“You read and write Hebrew?” Sam asked, and then kicked himself for it a moment later. “Of course you do. You invented it for all I know.”

Castiel shrugged. “It’s from the Song of Solomon,” he explained. “You might recognize it if it were in English.  _ Like an apple tree in the forest, is my beloved among sons…” _

_ “I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste,” _ Sam finished. He smiled.

“Humans have spent millennia trying to relay and translate messages my father sent them, just so they can justify shaming and killing one another,” Cas said. “And yet they canonize a love poem. You know I’m not much one for scripture, but I find something beautiful in that. Something that reminds me of you and Dean.”

Sam kissed him without further ado, and as he did so, and Castiel’s hand touched his face, he felt the aches and itching and stinging evaporate instantly from his back.

“Not to cheapen the moment,” Sam said, as they pulled away. “But I think I owe you something.”

“How so?” Cas asked, brows furrowed. 

“I fell asleep pretty quick after I got mine last night,” Sam said. “You never got yours.”

“Oh,” Cas muttered. “Well, it’s alright, I wasn’t offended.”

“But would you  _ like _ your thank you present now?” Sam asked.

Cas almost blushed. “For you, Sam?” He said. “Now, later… anytime you’ll have me, you know I’m yours.”

“How about always?” Sam laughed.

“Mm,” Castiel hummed. “Yes, always definitely sounds about right to me.”


End file.
